Insulated beverage container holders are well known in the art. The most popular is a sleeve made from foam which snugly surrounds a can. The foam sleeve normally covers 50% or more of the can thus insulating the can and beverage contained therein from the surrounding atmosphere. In the majority of instances the beverage is cold and the surrounding atmosphere is warm. The foam sleeve helps to keep the beverage cold during its consumption. Many companies utilize these insulated beverage holders for advertising purposes and provide them free of charge to their customers. An example of this type of insulated beverage container holder is found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,293,015, issued to McGough. Another advantage of this type of container holder is that condensation from the beverage container is retained by the foam material of the holder and not transferred to the consumer or neighboring surfaces such as furniture.
Recently, insulated beverage container holders for bottles, in particular long neck beer bottles, have become available. These holders are usually equipped with a zipper or other fastener to secure the conforming shape of the holder around the neck of the bottle.
These prior art beverage container holders must be purchased or obtained separately from the purchase of the beverage containers. The consumer of these beverages must remember to bring these prior art container holders with them whenever they are consuming the beverages. They also must remember to bring the container holders home so they can be used again.
What is needed in the art is an insulated beverage container holder or sleeve which does not need to be purchased separately from the beverages. Also, an insulated beverage container holder which is designed to be disposable with the package or carton in which the beverages are sold so that they do not have to be retained by the consumer for reuse.